About HMDA

The requires many financial institutions to maintain, report, and publicly disclose loan-level information about mortgages. HMDA was originally enacted by Congress in 1975 and is implemented by .

Congress amended HMDA in 2010 and the Bureau finalized a rule implementing changes to HMDA in 2015. Most of the rule's provisions affect data collected in 2018 and reported in 2019. However, beginning with data collected in 2017, depository institutions that originated fewer than 25 covered closed-end mortgages in either of the preceding two years are not required to report.

Why it's important

These public data are important because they help show whether lenders are serving the housing needs of their communities; they give public officials information that helps them make decisions and policies; and they shed light on lending patterns that could be discriminatory.

If you are concerned about mortgage discrimination or believe you have been discriminated against, please visit Ask Miss April.

Highlights from 2017 data

In 2017, there were 14.3 million HMDA records from 5,852 financial institutions based on data reported as of April 18, 2018.

The number of institutions reporting in 2017 fell 13.5 percent from 2016, partly due to the increase of the reporting threshold from one to 25 covered originations for depository institutions.

Working with HMDA data

You can explore HMDA data on your own using our online tools, which use HMDA data submitted as of April 18, 2018. Some financial institutions may have submitted changes to their data since that time. For the most current available data see

"What is HMDA?" video

Each year thousands of banks and other financial institutions report data about mortgages to the public, thanks to the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, or “HMDA” for short. These public data are important because:

Help show whether lenders are serving the housing needs of their communities;

Give public officials information that helps them make decisions and policies; and

Shed light on lending patterns that could be discriminatory

In recent years, HMDA public data have contained about 15 to 20 million records per year. If you’re wondering what kind of information is available in public HMDA data, let’s begin with how mortgage originations usually work.

Meet Emily. She wants to buy a home but doesn’t have the money to pay for it in cash, so she applies for a loan at her bank. She tells the bank about her finances, the house she wants to buy, and other information the bank needs to make a decision about whether or not to lend to her, and the terms of the loan. The bank reviews Emily’s application, decides that she meets their criteria, and she gets approved. Once all the papers are signed, Emily closes the loan... or in mortgage-speak, the loan is “originated.”

Now, let’s look at kind of information you can find in the public HMDA data:

First, you can find information about the loan itself. The data include mortgage applications, regardless of whether the application was approved or denied. You can also see the loan amount, and the type of loan, including whether it is a “VA” or “FHA” loan. The data also show if the loan is for buying a home, refinancing an existing mortgage, or for home improvements. If the application was denied, in some cases you can see the reasons why.

Second, the data include demographic information on applicants’ race, ethnicity, and sex. This helps prevent discriminatory lending. It’s important to note that the data do not include direct identifying information, like names or Social Security numbers.

Third, there are data about the lender. You can see the name of the lender and which agency regulates them.

And finally, there’s information about the property itself. You can see the type of property and whether the owner intends to live there. Instead of disclosing the address, lenders disclose the census tract, which is the part of a community where the property is located. Census tracts vary in size, but on average about 4,000 people live in a census tract. This provides enough information about the location to be useful, but still provides protections for individual privacy.

Each September, the previous year’s data are released to the public so that anyone – including consumers, public officials, community groups, researchers, developers, journalists, and the banks themselves – can use the data.

We hope you’ll explore the data further on your own! If you build something cool and want to share it with us, or want to see what we’ve made to help explore the data, check out the HMDA tools on .

Other Bureau Data

The Bureau also publishes complaint information on mortgages as well as other financial products. The data show the kinds of issues consumers have reported and how different companies have responded. You can view, sort and analyze the data, or you can download or build on the data using our API.